


Bound Together

by Midorisakura (Calacious)



Category: General Hospital
Genre: AU, Action & Romance, Fluff and Angst, Handcuffs, Kid Fic, Kidnapping, M/M, Trope Bingo Round 3, kid!spinelli
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-04
Updated: 2014-03-04
Packaged: 2018-01-14 12:46:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1267108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calacious/pseuds/Midorisakura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jason is looking for an allegedly dead Sonny when he happens upon a kidnapping in progress. To save the little boy, he handcuffs himself to him, and ends up with more than he bargained for. Inspired by an episode of a TV show called, "The Bill."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bound Together

**Author's Note:**

> Trope bingo prompt: Handcuffed/ Bound Together
> 
> Started awhile back, but finished today, because of the prompt.

He fumbles for the handcuffs, knowing that if he doesn’t act soon, they’ll be separated, and he’s terrified of what will happen to the kid if they are. Jason doesn’t know how he got himself into this mess, but he doesn’t regret getting involved, even after he’s clocked over the head by a masked goon with a gun and made to carry the child out to an unmarked van. He isn’t quite seeing double, but his head feels like it has been split in two.

 

“Easy there, kid,” he whispers when the boy whimpers against his shoulder.

 

“Shut up,” one of the masked men shouts, pointing a gun at him, and he would laugh, except the kid’s softly crying into the crook of his neck and he can feel the boy’s fear seeping into him.

 

“Why’d he have to go and handcuff himself to the kid?” the driver of the van asks.  “You know the boss isn’t going to like this.”

 

“Yeah, I know, just shut up,” the man in the back of the van says.

 

Jason can feel the man’s eyes on him, knows that he’s being assessed. He tries to relax against the back of the van so that he doesn’t appear threatening. The kid settles a little more into his arms, and Jason thanks his lucky stars that he’d lifted the handcuffs off of Lucky earlier that day. Maybe it was premonition, or maybe it was just the vision he’d had of Johnny, splayed out on his bed, handcuffed to the headboard, begging him to do all kinds of nasty things to him. Whatever it was, all that Jason knows is that it has turned out to be rather convenient for him now.

 

“I want my Gramma,” the boy says.

 

“Shut him up,” the masked man says and Jason can feel the boy flinch against his side. “‘Sides the kid ain’t got no gramma left to go back to.” 

 

The kid cries harder at the words, and the masked man laughs, threatens Jason and the boy with the gun. 

 

“Shh,” Jason rubs his hand down the boy’s back,“everything’s going to be fine.”

 

He doesn’t know if it is, or what the man meant about the kid no longer having a gramma to go back to, but it’s all he’s got and it sounds like the right thing to say. He knows that he won’t be letting these goons walk away from this. That, when he can make sure the boy is safe, he will kill the men who’ve taken them hostage. He has no qualms about it and doesn’t even care if it is the right thing to do or not.

 

He wonders what Johnny’s doing, if the man has managed to keep his cool during his grandfather’s arraignment for the murder of Sonny Corinthos. Sonny’s body hasn’t been found, and Jason knows that it is only a matter of time before the man shows up, alive, again. When it comes to Sonny, death isn’t permanent.

 

The kid sniffs and wipes his nose on Jason’s tee-shirt, he tries not to let it disgust him, but Jason isn’t thrilled about being used as the kid’s impromptu tissue. He’s a mobster, not a Kleenex.  Even so, he knows that asking the thugs who’ve nabbed them for a tissue for the kid will get them squat. Or maybe just laughed at, which, in Jason’s opinion would be worse than them doing nothing.

 

The kid, and he doesn’t even know the name of the dark-haired boy that he’d attempted to rescue, snuggles (mobsters don’t snuggle) against him like he’s some kind of living teddy bear. 

 

It’s rather disconcerting, not to mention uncomfortable, because of the heat that’s coming off of the boy. He wonders if this is normal, if children normally feel as hot as a furnace in the middle of winter, or if the kid’s got a fever.

 

“Hey kid, what’s your name?” Jason asks.

 

“Damien,” the kid whispers, hiccoughing.  “I’m four,” he says , and he pulls away just long enough to shove the requisite amount of fingers in Jason’s face before once more glomming to him like he’s some kind of leech.

 

Jason wonders why the little kid, Damien, thought he needed to know how old he was.  It didn’t make a difference to Jason whether the kid was four or six, or whatever. He’d have done the same thing.

 

“That’s,” Jason searches for the right word, “uh, nice,” he says.

 

“I turned four,” Damien continues, “yesterday.”

 

“I see,” Jason says, even though he really doesn’t see the importance of this conversation.

 

He doesn’t celebrate birthdays as a rule. Johnny’s recent private party for his thirtieth birthday, because his lover had insisted that it was an important year to mark, was an exception to the rule. It was also the first birthday party that Jason had enjoyed. Of course that might’ve had something to do with Johnny’s rather elaborately intimate present more than the ‘party’ itself. He had pictures, and video, as visual reminders of the occasion.  

 

Jason very much doubted that Damien’s party would be quite as memorable as the years passed and wondered what little kids did to celebrate their birthdays anyway. He had no memories of his childhood birthday parties, thanks to his brother AJ’s drinking problem which had led to  an accident that had caused Jason brain damage so severe that it had irreversibly cost him his memories and had forever altered his personality.  It didn’t really bother him, but it bothered those who claimed to have known him prior to the accident, like his mother, Monica Quartermaine.

 

“I got my very own cake,” Damien says, his lips moving against Jason’s chest, “and Gramma invited friends over, though I really don’t have any friends, they were just some boys from church, the ones that don’t pick on me.”

 

Jason wonders when, in between handcuffing the kid to himself and getting clobbered over the head by the thugs trying to kidnap the kid to getting shoved into the van, he’d become the kid’s confidante. This was more Carly’s sort of thing, hell, even Johnny’d be better at this than he was bound to be. 

 

He doesn’t say anything, hoping that, with the movement of the van, Damien will fall asleep. He’s trying to figure out where they’re being taken, trying to listen for sounds outside of the windowless van which will give him a clue as to which direction they’re heading in.  

 

He thinks they’re southerly bound, though he can’t be certain, what with Damien’s chatter and his pounding head. Jason questions his decision to make the trip to Tennessee to look for Sonny in an attempt to clear Johnny’s grandfather of the murder charges that he’s facing. If anyone asked him, which they hadn’t, the world would be better without Anthony in it, and Johnny would be better off without Anthony hanging around to guilt him all the damn time. 

 

He should’ve just listened to Johnny and left well enough alone. It wasn’t like the other man was overly concerned about the prospect of his grandfather being incarcerated, but Jason had hoped that finding Sonny might help to put an end to the feud between the two rivals, which would make his and Johnny’s involvement with each other a lot less difficult.

 

“They even gave me presents,” Damien says, like it’s something out of the ordinary.

 

Even Jason knows that it’s customary for children to get presents on their birthdays. He can feel the boy’s lips turn upward in a grin, it tugs the fabric of his tee-shirt.

 

In spite of himself, Jason asks, “So, what’d you get for your birthday?”

 

This causes an even bigger smile and Jason wonders what the kid’s face looks like when it’s lit up by a smile. He’s only seen it twisted in fear.

 

“I got a remote control car, and a computer game , it’s the newest Mario game, except I don’t have the right console to play it, and I don’t think Gramma would let me play it anyway, and,” Damien takes a deep breath as though he’s been running hard, and Jason wonders how anyone can talk so fast, let alone a four year old kid, “I got some clothes from Gramma and Grampa and a boy named Skylar, I don’t really know him, but he gave me the I ron Man  movie...”

 

“Hey kid,” the thug in the back of the van says, “shut up, will you? Your babbling’s driving me crazy. Don’t anyone want to hear what you got for your birthday.”

 

Damien tenses in his arms and Jason shoots the armed thug a look that promises the man dismemberment. The thug just stares back at him, a smug look on his face because he’d succeeded in, not only getting the kid to shut up, but in scaring him to boot.

 

Jason opens his mouth to say something that he hopes will comfort the child, but the thug shakes his head.

 

“No more talking,” he says, pointing the gun at the back of Damien’s head and pretending to shoot.  He gives Jason a wicked smile and a look that challenges him to say something.

 

Jason clasps Damien tighter to himself and quite literally bites his tongue, biding his time until he can make good on his silent threats. He wonders if Sonny is behind this, and hopes for his boss’ sake that he isn’t, because while he might not like children much, Jason doesn’t sanction the kidnapping and harming of them.

 

Soon the movement of the van and Jason’s gentle, soothing touches lull the six year old to sleep, and if anything, the kid feels heavier and hotter to the touch. Jason chances a look at the boy’s face and is alarmed to find that it’s flushed, his dark hair is plastered to his forehead with sweat, and while Jason is hopeful that it’s because of the stifling heat of the van, coupled with shared body heat, he isn’t overly optimistic because his luck doesn’t run that way.

 

“I think the kid’s sick,” he says, pressing the back of his hand to the kid’s forehead, hoping that   the trigger happy thug isn’t going to do something to the kid because he’d opened his mouth.

 

“Doesn’t matter,” the thug says, shrugging. “Nobody said nothing about the need to make sure the kid didn’t get sick or anything.”

 

“What  were your orders?” Jason asks, steeling himself for retribution.

 

The thug laughs. “Like I’d tell you, Superman.”

 

Jason glares at him, and shifts the kid’s weight a little to regain the circulation in his left arm.  He wonders how mothers do it, how they can hold their children for hours on end without losing a limb.

 

“Hey Lenny, we almost there?” the thug calls up to the front of the van.

 

“You idiot,” Lenny shouts back, turning to face his partner, “now they know our names.”

 

“We’ve got a four year old kid and the doofus who handcuffed himself  to the brat, what’s it matter if they know our names or not?”

 

“Fine,  Carl, ” Lenny says, turning back to  face the road just in time to jerk  out of the oncoming traffic lane he’d inadvertently swerved into while he’d been confronting his partner.  “We’ll be there shortly, don’t get your panties in a bunch.”

 

“Try not to get us killed, will ya,” Carl snarls and he points the gun at Jason when he realizes that he’s being watched.

 

Jason shakes his head and gives him a look which clearly says, ‘idiot’.

 

“What the hell are you looking at?” Carl asks.

 

“Nothing,” Jason says. “Not a goddamn thing.”

 

He rests his cheek against the top of Damien’s head and readies himself to act once the van has stopped moving. He can’t let Lenny and Carl take him and Damien anywhere else. There are too many unknown variables as it is.

 

He has Damien’s ankle handcuffed to his wrist, it was all he could think to do at the time. Now, though, he has to work his wrist out of the cuff without Carl noticing. Though the thug appears to be rather dimwitted, at least by Jason’s standards, the man isn’t blind, and Jason isn’t going to take any chances, not with himself and definitely not with the kid.

 

Carl’s eyes narrow when Jason shifts Damien once again, this time to cover up what he’s about to do, rather than to ease the dull ache that has set in from holding the kid for such a long time. By his calculation, they’ve been traveling south for at least a couple of hours. Jason hasn’t even held Michael or Morgan for this long.

 

“Crick in my neck,” he says by way of explanation when it looks like Carl’s about ready to get up and walk over to him.

 

Carl nods and smirks. “Kids can get real heavy, ‘specially when they’re sleeping,” he says.

 

“Yeah,” Jason agrees, “they can.”

 

He puts a fake smile on his face and dislocates his thumb. He’s done this before, too many times to count, and it’s painful each and every time. This time is not an exception, but he bites the inside of his lip and disguises his wince with the smile he’s plastered into place.

 

He carefully slips his wrist out of the handcuff and  pops his thumb back into place, massaging it with the thumb and forefinger of the hand he has wrapped around Damien’s middle.  Carl appears to be none the wiser, and Jason is relieved, though he’s a little worried about the kid who hasn’t so much as stirred.

 

Damien’s breathing is even and shallow, warm and moist against Jason’s neck. He has no idea if this is normal for kids or not, and regrets not having paid much attention to Carly when she was talking about Michael and Morgan.

 

“My Tommy,” Carl says, “once he’s out, he’s out, nothing can wake that kid, not even an earthquake, but Jenny on the other hand, she’s a light sleeper, that one. I swear the soft tread of a mouse could wake her.”

 

Shit,  Jason thinks,  the thug’s got a family. 

 

He’d been set to kill Carl and Lenny, but now he has to rethink that plan. He doesn’t want to be the man who kills Tommy and Jenny’s daddy, even if their daddy is an idiot and has made one of the worst mistakes of his life by kidnapping him. 

 

Jason was not considered to be a stone cold killer just because the nickname sounded cool. He had earned that reputation well.  But, and not many people outside of Johnny, Carly and Sonny, knew this, he drew the line at women and children. Carly calls him a stone cold killer with a heart of gold, Sonny says he’s soft, and Johnny, well, he’s got all sorts of nicknames for Jason, some of them are even rated PG.

 

“Shut your mouth, Carl,” Lenny advises, “you don’t need to tell the man your whole life story.”

 

“What’s he gonna do about it anyway? Besides, I’m bored, I thought you said we were almost there,” Carl says, gesturing with his gun-hand as he talks.

 

“Watch where you’re pointing that thing would you? We don’t get paid if we don’t deliver the kid alive,” Lenny says.

 

“I’ve got it under control,” Carl shouts, and Jason considers his options carefully. 

 

He could try to take Carl out now, or wait until Lenny stops the van and barrel his way past Carl and out the back of the van, but he doesn’t know who’ll be waiting for them, wherever it is they’re being taken, and there’s the kid to consider. If it was just himself, Jason would take his chances.

 

“Yeah,” Lenny responds dryly, “I can see that, just point the gun at our stowaway, okay?”

 

Though he grumbles, Carl does just that, glaring at Jason as he does so. Though he supposes that Carl means for his look to be menacing, it does the exact opposite for him and Jason finds himself keeping his laughter in check and biting his tongue.

 

Just as he’s about to make a move for Carl’s gun, shifting Damien  so that he can place the boy gently on the floor of the van, his cellphone goes off and Jason groans as some girly, upbeat tune starts playing.  He’s going to kill Carly for messing with his phone again.

 

“My little girl loves that song,” Carl says, to make matters worse.

 

“You idiot,” Lenny snarls, but he, much to Jason’s relief, keeps his eyes on the road this time, “why the hell didn’t you grab his cell?”

 

“I thought you had it, besides you never told me to get it. It’s not like he can answer his phone anyway,” Carl says.

 

“Yeah, well cellphones can be traced,” Lenny says.

 

“What, you think this guy’s a cop or something?” Carl asks, really looking at Jason this time.

 

“Who the hell else carries around a set of handcuffs you idiot?” Lenny asks.

 

Jason could give him at least half a dozen answers for that question, but he highly doubts that’s what Lenny’s after. Jason finds the thought of him being mistaken for a cop hilarious and laughs.

 

“You think I’m a cop?” he asks once his laughter has subsided.

 

“You trying to tell me you ain’t?” Carl asks, completely sold on the idea now that Lenny has planted it in his head.

 

“I’m not a cop,” Jason says, and he thinks,  I’m as far from a cop as you can get.

 

“Who else besides a cop would handcuff himself to some loser kid?” Carl asks, and his words make Jason reconsider his revised plan to let Tommy and Jenny’s dad live.

 

“What is it you two want with him anyway?” Jason asks.

 

“We ain’t telling you nothin’, cop,” Carl sneers.

 

“Why don’t you tell us what you were doing at that house?” Lenny asks.

 

“I was looking for a friend,” Jason answers honestly, keeping the identity of his friend to himself.  

 

He’d followed a lead from Sonny’s father, Mike, who’d told Jason that Sonny had a hideout in Tennessee. At first he’d laughed it off, because, Sonny in Tennessee was a laughable concept.  But, he’d checked it out anyway, wanting to get to the bottom of whatever it was that Sonny had planned against Anthony Zacchara and make sure that Johnny didn’t get caught in the crossfire.  He hadn’t realized until too late that he was at the wrong address, and by then he was stuck sitting in the back of a moving van with a little boy plastered to him.

 

“A friend?” Carl sounds skeptical, and Jason nods.

 

“Yeah,” he says. “I didn’t find him. Instead, I came across you two idiots.”

 

“You better watch who you call an idiot.” Carl jabs the barrel of the gun in his direction.

 

Jason wants to ask what he’ll do about it, but thinks better of it, because, while he doesn’t doubt that he’d have the upper hand if Carl was to press the issue and go after him, he doesn’t want to put Damien in any unnecessary danger.

 

“Cool it, we’re almost there,” Lenny says.

 

"And the money?" Carl asks, his attention momentarily diverted to the front of the van.

 

The rest of the conversation is summarily cut off as Jason launches into action. In one, seamless movement,  he lies Damien on the floor of the van and almost simultaneously tackles Carl, wresting the gun from the surprised thug’s hand.

 

The van lurches to the side and comes to a jerking halt as Lenny slams the brake and reaches for the weapon he's stashed beneath his seat. Jason doesn't give the man a chance to even touch his gun.Without even thinking about it, and without remorse, Jason puts a bullet in the man's head, killing him instantly.

 

It's almost comical the way Carl's eyes go wide and his mouth opens and closes wordlessly. The thug can't even make a sound, but he's gesturing back and forth from Jason to Lenny's lifeless body in the front of the van.

 

When speech finally finds its way through the man's terror, he stammers.

 

"You're a cop, you're not supposed to kill anyone, aren't you supposed to read us our rights or something?"

 

"I told you, I'm not a cop," Jason says, and he gives the man the grin his godson had labeled his shark smile.

 

Apparently it is as scary as Morgan had said it was because Carl wets himself, or maybe it's the winning combination of his shark smile along with the gun trained on him that does the trick. Jason would like to think that it was his smile alone, but he's not a vain man, he'll leave vanity to Sonny.

 

"What are you then? A bounty hunter?" Carl asks.

 

Jason shakes his head.

 

"As much as I'd like to stay and play twenty questions with you, I'm going to have to take my leave," Jason says.

 

"Please don't shoot me," Carl begs and Jason just smiles.

 

"Why would I shoot Tommy and Jenny's father?" he asks as he scoops Damien off the floor of the van and cradles him against his shoulder. "Turn around," he orders, and, shaking, Carl complies. "Kneel and place your hands on the floor of the van." Carl doesn't hesitate to do as he's told.

 

Using the butt of Carl's gun, Jason hits the man on the back of the head, knocking him unconscious. Jason uses the hem of his tee-shirt to wipe his prints off the weapon and then he places it in Carl's hand, firing the weapon once again, shooting through the floor of the van so that he doesn't hit an innocent bystander.

 

Setting Carl up to take the fall for his partner's death is a much better plan than killing both men, and he won't have to pay Diane's exorbitant fee for clearing him of murder in another state. In Jason's eyes it's a win-win situation, and Tommy and Jenny don't lose their daddy. Instead, they can go visit him in prison.

 

Damien chooses that moment to wake, and Jason quickly twists away so that the child doesn't see what happened in the front of the van. He might be a cold-blooded killer, but he doesn't want to expose someone as young as Damien to such violence. Even he has a conscience, no matter how ill-used, or small, it is. 

 

“I feel sick,” Damien mumbles, and he rubs at his eyes. 

 

Shit. 

 

“You ain’t gonna throw up, are you?” Jason asks, he’s only mildly relieved when Damien shakes his head. 

 

The boy looks much too pale, and his cheeks are bright red spots that make Jason think,  fever. 

 

He sprints over to a parked car. The door isn’t locked, and Jason thanks his lucky stars that it isn’t. He settles the little boy into the passenger’s seat, and then quickly hotwires the car. 

 

For being out of practice, he isn’t half bad. He peels away from the curb before anyone can notice that a car is being stolen. He’ll use it to bring Damien home, and retrieve his car, and then he’s getting the hell out of dodge. He’s done looking for Sonny, the man can rot in hiding for all he cares.

 

The little boy stares at him imploringly, and Jason stares back, unblinking. 

 

“Can you help me with my seatbelt?” Damien asks, and then he sucks in a breath, and Jason’s almost afraid the kid’s going to cry. “Please?”

 

Jason frowns, nods, and then snaps the belt into place. He does up his own as well when Damien gives him a look. 

 

“I’m going to take you home,” Jason says, his eyes dart to the rear view mirror to catch the kid’s eyes. 

 

When Damien doesn’t react to the news, other than to sink back against his seat, the hairs on the back of Jason’s neck stand up and he wonders why the little boy isn’t at least smiling or showing some kind of enthusiasm at the news of returning home. He should be excited, but he isn’t, and that doesn’t sit right with Jason. 

 

“What’s wrong?”

 

Jason watches Damien through the rearview mirror, sees the boy flinch a little at the question. 

 

“Nothing,” Damien says, and he wraps his arms around himself. “I’m just tired.” 

 

He rests his head against the window. 

 

“Did you steal this car?”

 

Jason raises an eyebrow. "I'm just borrowing it."

 

"Granny says it's wrong to take stuff without permission," Damien says, and he turns in his seat to look at Jason. "Did you ask if you could borrow the car?”

 

“Who are you, Jiminy Cricket?” Jason asks sourly.

 

The boy’s face scrunches up in confusion, and he shakes his head so hard that Jason’s afraid he’s going to hit his head against the passenger’s door. 

 

“Uh-uh, I’m Damien Millhouse Spinelli, not Jimmy Cricket.”

 

The fact that Jason even knows about the little green counterpart to Gepetto’s Pinocchio is enough to make him inwardly groan. He’d been forced to watch the animated movie for what felt like a hundred times by little Morgan who loved the tale. Jason was surprised that Damien had never heard of Jiminy Cricket. He was about the same age as Morgan. 

 

"Nevermind, kid,” Jason says, and he wonders if the four-year-old knows his own address. He knows that Carly’s drilled it into her boys, along with her cell number, but he doesn’t know if that’s the norm.

 

“Where do you live?” Jason asks, wondering if he can backtrack to where Damien had been taken from. 

 

Damien shrugs. “I forget.”

 

Jason resists the urge to swear aloud, and he silently counts to ten. “Damien, I...”

 

“Gramma didn’t wake up,” Damien says quietly, his eyes trained on the scenery flashing by past the car.

 

Jason frowns, and his stomach drops. The thug had said that the kid didn’t have a gramma to go back to, and he wonders if the men had killed her in front of the kid. He wishes 

that he hadn’t left Tommy and Jenny’s dad alive after all. 

 

"It was red,” Damien’s voice is quiet, and Jason has to strain to hear him speak. “So much red.” 

 

Damien shivers and Jason reaches a hand out to comfort him, but the little boy flinches away from him, and Jason pulls his hand back, concentrating on the road. They’re in a residential area, so he sticks to the speed limit, trying to find how to get to a freeway. 

 

“It’s okay,” Jason lies. 

 

It’s not okay, and now he’s got nowhere to take the kid, except for the police or social services, and he’s not going to do that. He fishes his cell out of his pocket and sees that the call he missed earlier was from Johnny. He hits speed dial, and isn’t surprised when Johnny answers right away. 

 

“Jase, where the fuck have you been?” Johnny's voice is filled with worry. “Why didn’t you check in?”

 

“I ran into a bit of a snag,” Jason says, eyeing Damien out of the corner of his eye. 

 

The little boy is sleeping, slumped against the passenger seat, forehead plastered to the window. He looks kind of cute, and innocent like that, and Jason’s heart does something funny at that revelation. 

 

“What kind of snag?” Johnny asks, voice filled with skepticism.

 

“Let’s just say that it’ll be at least a day and a half drive before I’m home. Looks like I’m in...” he’d finally reached the freeway. “West Virginia.”

 

“What kind of snag?” Johnny persists. “You find Sonny?”

 

“No,” Jason says, he sees a billboard for a car rental place, and notes the exit. He’ll ditch the car he stole and use one of his aliases to rent another one. 

 

“But I found someone else.” He eyes the little boy again. Damien hasn’t shifted since Jason last looked at him, and he seems to be okay. 

 

“Who?” Johnny’s voice is wary, as though he already knows what Jason is going to say. 

 

“I’ll tell you when I get home,” Jason says, because he’s not sure how to explain why he doesn’t just drop the kid off in front of the police station or at a hospital, leaving him for someone else to take care of instead of a mobster and his former mobster lover. He isn’t sure of the motivation himself, because he’s never wanted to be a father, and he doesn’t think Johnny’s ever wanted to be a father either, but there’s something about little Damien that tugs at his heart, and makes him want to try. 

 

It takes less than a day and a half to get home, even with pit stops, and Jason changes out rental car for rental car, explaining to Damien with more patience than he can usually muster that, yes, he does have permission to ‘borrow’ the car, and that they will be returning it when they’re done borrowing it. Damien sleeps on and off, and Jason takes a three hour nap at one of the rest stops. He’s eager to get home, to get back to Johnny, and to get out of the clothes he’s been living in for the past three days. 

 

“Time to wake up, Damien,” Jason says, jostling the little boy. When Damien doesn’t rouse so much as turn over and nestle against the seat, Jason sighs and works the little boy free of the seat belt.

 

“C’mon sleepyhead,” Jason says, and he inwardly winces, wondering where such a term of endearment has come from. It’s atypical of him, as is the way that he’s cradling the boy to himself. 

 

The handcuff’s still dangling from the little boy’s foot, and Jason felt like a world class idiot. He’d forgotten about it, and, if this is a sign of what’s to come with regard to his taking care of the boy, then he’s clearly bitten off more than he can chew. 

 

When he reaches the penthouse that he shares with Johnny, Jason feels some of the tension that’s been building since he left in search of Sonny ease. Damien stirs, and Jason quiets him, bouncing in place while he moves to unlock the door. 

 

The door’s pulled open before he can quite get the key into the lock, and Johnny’s standing on the other side of it, eyes locked on Jason, promising him a welcome home that he won’t forget, but Damien stirs and turns to look at Johnny. 

 

“Jason, what the --” Johnny censors himself, and gestures toward the child.

 

Closing the door behind him, Jason moves into the penthouse, shucking his shoes off, and heading to the couch. He’s exhausted, and Damien’s starting to get heavy, and all he wants to do right now is go upstairs, shower, and crawl beneath the sheets of his bed, preferably with Johnny. 

 

But, none of that is going to happen right now, because the kid’s wide awake, clinging to him, peering at Johnny from around the safety of Jason’s shoulder. He sits down heavily, groaning, and leaning back against the cushions. Damien shifts his weight, settling on Jason’s lap, and he hides his face against Jason’s chest when Johnny approaches. 

 

“Jason?” Johnny sits beside him, eyes trained on the little boy who is doing his best to appear as invisible as possible. 

 

“I couldn’t let them take him,” Jason says, knowing that he’s not making much sense, and praying that Johnny will let it go for now, trusting that, when he’s rested and more coherent, he’ll explain everything to him. 

 

Johnny nods, and, when Damien twists his head to the side to peek at him, he smiles. It’s a nice smile, one that Jason doesn’t think he’s ever seen on Johnny’s face before, and he finds that he likes it, and apparently Damien does too, because he breathes a little easier, and loosens his death grip on Jason. 

 

“What’s his name?” Johnny asks.

 

“My name’s Damien,” Damien says, and he holds four fingers in front of Johnny’s face, wiggling them. “I’m four.”

 

“Nice to meet you, Damien,” Johnny says, and he holds a hand out to Damien, shaking hands with the little boy. “I’m Johnny.”

 

Damien offers him a shy smile, and drops his head on Jason’s shoulder, yawning. They’re all tired -- Jason can see dark circles under Johnny’s eyes, and he knows that the man hasn’t been sleeping well, maybe not at all, since he’d left. 

 

“How about if we all go upstairs and get some sleep?” Jason suggests. 

 

“Sounds like a good idea,” Johnny agrees, and he casts a pointed look in Damien’s direction. 

 

They have a guest room, and Jason guesses that, if they’re really going to do this -- if he can get Johnny to agree, and have Diane draw up the paperwork, make all of this appear to be as legal as possible -- then they’ll have to make the guest room into something more suitable for a little boy. He finds that the thought doesn’t scare him as much as it had when he’d been thinking about it while he drove. 

 

Damien drops off to sleep the minute his head hits the pillow -- and for tonight the little boy will sleep with them, because the guest room needs some work to make it habitable -- and Johnny works the handcuff free while Jason showers. 

 

He works the kinks out of his muscles, takes in the bruises that the thugs left on him. He hisses when the water hits the cut on his head, watches the water run brown and coppery as he washes the dried blood out of his hair. There’s no fresh blood, and his headache has long since subsided. He’s okay, and the kid’s okay, and Johnny hasn’t started yelling at him, yet, so all is good. 

 

When he stumbles into the bedroom, the fatigue hitting him suddenly, Johnny’s there to catch him, and lead him to bed. Damien sleeps, nestled between them, Johnny’s arm flung across the child’s back, hand resting on Jason’s stomach. It’s oddly comfortable, and Jason falls asleep to the gentle rhythm of Damien’s quiet snores, the feel of Johnny’s hand, warm and solid, grounding him. 

 

He doesn’t know what will happen when they wake, but he feels strangely optimistic about what the light of day will bring for Johnny, Damien, and him, sensing that they are somehow bound together now, and that he’d been handcuffed to the little boy for reasons that he couldn’t even begin to fathom. 

 

“It wasn’t an accident,” Jason murmurs as he drifts off to sleep, hand resting on the back of Damien’s head, dreaming of a family photo where a little boy is sitting between two dark-haired men -- smiles splitting their faces. 

 

When he wakes, Damien’s arms wrapped around his neck, and Johnny’s around his waist, face nestled in the crook of his neck, Jason realizes that this is what’s been missing in his life -- family. Smiling, he kisses Johnny, careful not to disturb the still sleeping Damien. 

 

“So, we adopting?” Johnny asks, voice gruff from sleep.

 

Jason nods. “That okay?”

 

Smiling, eyes cast down toward the sleeping boy, Johnny nods. “It feels right.”

 

“Yeah, it does.”

 

Jason tells Johnny what happened, explains why he couldn’t bring Damien home, and they call Diane who lectures them about proper procedures and what not, but promises to draw up the papers that day. By tomorrow afternoon, they’ll be married, and the proud fathers of Damien M. Spinelli Morgan-Zacchara. It’s a lot, and it’s sudden, but then again, what in life isn’t?


End file.
